A former state conservation warden has been ordered to pay a fine for killing a wolf at his northern Wisconsin home two years ago, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.<\/p>\n
In 2023, Pat Quaintance of Bayfield reported<\/a> to police that he\u2019d killed the collared wolf during the early morning hours of Christmas Day. Quaintance is a hound hunter and former conservation warden with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, as well as a past president of the Wisconsin Wildlife Federation.<\/p>\n The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service investigated the killing. An agency spokesperson confirmed Wednesday that a fine had been issued to Quaintance, but declined to disclose the amount because it\u2019s still classified as an open case. The agency is coordinating with the Red Cliff Band of Lake Superior Chippewa on transfer of the animal\u2019s remains to the tribe.<\/p>\n News with a little more humanity<\/p>\n WPR\u2019s \u201cWisconsin Today\u201d newsletter keeps you connected to the state you love without feeling overwhelmed. No paywall. No agenda. No corporate filter.<\/p>\n When reached by phone Wednesday, Quaintance said the case \u201cis over and done with\u201d and declined to comment further before hanging up.<\/p>\n Paul Collins, Wisconsin state director of Animal Wellness Action, said he\u2019s disappointed in the agency\u2019s decision and doesn\u2019t think a fine is an appropriate penalty since the gray wolf is listed as an endangered species.<\/p>\n \u201cAny time federally protected or state protected species are killed, there should be some significant penalty other than just fines,\u201d Collins said. \u201cThere should be jail time.\u201d<\/p>\n A 2022 federal court ruling <\/a>restored protections for the animal after it was delisted in 2021. The U.S. House of Representatives is set to vote Thursday on a bill<\/a> that would remove federal protections for wolves nationwide.<\/p>\n It\u2019s illegal to kill a wolf except when defending a human life while the animal is listed as an endangered species, according to the DNR<\/a>. People who illegally kill an endangered species can face a maximum of one year in prison and up to a $100,000 fine. Organizations can face up to a $200,000 fine.<\/p>\n Less than a week before the incident, Quaintance told the state Senate\u2019s sporting heritage committee that wolves were \u201cgetting bolder\u201d and had come within 100 yards of his home, adding that they had followed a neighbor riding a four-wheeler. Two months earlier, he told the Natural Resources Board<\/a> that he didn\u2019t feel safe walking dogs on his property.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat we want to do is see the wolves managed, and we want to see them managed in a proper way,\u201d he told the board.<\/p>\n Quaintance has supported bringing the population down to 350 wolves in line with a goal set under an older version of the state\u2019s wolf management plan. He\u2019s previously been cited twice for trapping violations, but one charge was later dismissed.<\/p>\n This summer, Chris Vaughan, the group\u2019s Wisconsin state director of Hunter Nation, organized a GoFundMe site<\/a> to help Quaintance pay for his legal fees in the case and committed to matching funds raised for the first $5,000.<\/p>\n Vaughan did not respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n In a short film<\/a> about the slain wolf, Red Cliff Tribal Council Member Misty Nordin said the animal wasn\u2019t just another predator.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s not something that we can just be like, \u2018Oh well, that was just another wolf that died.\u2019 It\u2019s not like that for us,\u201d Nordin said. \u201cThat\u2019s family.\u201d<\/p>\n The most recent wolf monitoring report shows 12 wolves<\/a> were killed illegally in Wisconsin from April 2024 through April of this year. Randy Johnson, the DNR\u2019s large carnivore specialist, said illegal killings are unfortunately prevalent in the state. He pointed to a 2018 study<\/a> that estimated nearly 10 percent of wolves are illegally killed. The state currently has around 1,200 wolves<\/a>. <\/p>\n The state had two confirmed incidents of wolves classified as a threat to human health and safety in the most recent monitoring period, but the animals behaved in a \u201cnon-aggressive\u201d manner in both incidents.<\/p>\n There have only been two fatal wolf attacks<\/a> on humans across North America in the last 20 years. Researchers have documented at least 26 fatal wolf attacks<\/a> worldwide from 2002 to 2020.<\/p>\n Johnson said Wisconsin has had no recorded wolf attacks on humans in modern times.<\/p>\n Wisconsin Public Radio, \u00a9 Copyright 2025, Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System and Wisconsin Educational Communications Board.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A former state conservation warden has been ordered to pay a fine for killing a wolf at his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":357223,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[2027,192,9746,3,79,201],"class_list":{"0":"post-357222","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-endangered-species","9":"tag-environment","10":"tag-law","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-science","13":"tag-wildlife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357222","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=357222"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357222\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/357223"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=357222"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=357222"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=357222"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}